Nadia District in West Bengal gets 2015 UN Public Service Award

Nadia district in West Bengal has won the 2015 United Nations Public Service Award in the category of improving delivery of public services for the initiative ‘Sabar Shouchagar’

It was announced by the West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee. The award will be presented by the UN Secretary General in June 2015 in Medellin, Colombia.

Nadia district is the first open defecation free district in country. The district had achieved this feat by making toilets available for all under state governments flagship programme Sabar Shouchagar.

Work in regard to making the Nadia district free from open defecation was initiated in 2013. In one-and-half-years, toilets were built in 5 lakh households and over 200 cluster toilets in public places. For this project around Rs 400 crore was spent.

After completion of the building toilets under the project, the percentage of people defecating in open has gone down to 0.02 per cent compared to 33.8 per cent when project was started.